1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an electrical connector, and particularly to an electrical connector having board locks for securing the connector onto a printed circuit board.
2. Description of Prior Art
Referring to U.S. Pat. No. 5,797,769 issued on Aug. 25, 1998 to Yang et al., a conventional electrical connector comprises an insulative housing with a plurality of contacts received therein and a pair of board locks retained in the housing. Each board lock comprises a fixed portion for being fixed onto the housing, an intermediate portion perpendicularly extending from the fixed portion, and a tail portion perpendicularly extending from the intermediate portion. The tail portion consists of a pair of legs for being inserted into corresponding through holes of a printed circuit board (PCB) to secure the connector onto the PCB.
However, the board locks only provide the connector with a retention force in a left-to-right direction. Therefore, the connector is unstably retained in the PCB in a front-to-back direction before the contacts are subjected to a soldering process. This will cause the instability during the soldering process of the contacts and increase the difficulty of soldering. As a result, the electrical connection between the connector and the PCB may be unreliable and the quality of signal transmission therebetween may be adversely affected. Hence, an electrical connector with improved board locks is required to overcome the disadvantages of the related art.
Accordingly, the object of the present invention is to provide an electrical connector with board locks which can make the electrical connector stably mounted on a printed circuit board, thereby ensuring a reliable electrical connection between the electrical connector and the printed circuit board.
In order to achieve the above-mentioned object, an electrical connector in accordance with the present invention comprises an insulative housing, a plurality of terminals received in the housing, a shell partially enclosing the housing, a pair of board locks and a pair of fasteners assembling the board locks onto the housing. Each board lock comprises a fixed section fixed to the connector and a pair of spaced legs connected to the fixed section by means of a resilient section. The legs are formed with convex portions arranged on opposite outer edges thereof for engaging with inner walls of a hole of a PCB into which the legs are inserted and retention portions arranged on opposite inner edges thereof for abutting against a bottom face of the PCB, thereby securely and stably retaining the connector on the PCB.